


Dormant

by Zarathastra



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: D/s relationship, M/M, NC17
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-04
Updated: 2015-01-04
Packaged: 2018-03-05 10:25:47
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,960
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3116636
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zarathastra/pseuds/Zarathastra
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Another post-case celebration.  But they've moved on a bit in the meantime.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dormant

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to everyone who checked out my previous story, the interest is deeply appreciated. This is kind of a follow-up it's set several months afterwards. Sherlock and John are still on their way to figuring out what they are to each other.

Another case cracked, as Mycroft would say.

After the chase, which somehow involved a man with a string of herbal sausages and a meat cleaver, and concluded with John suddenly vowing to become a vegetarian, there was the inevitable deconstruction of the case. 

It played out as it usually did, the final moments when the murderer stood in handcuffs between two tall policemen, while everyone stood around listening to Sherlock pontificating, relating the path of his conclusions.

He spoke rapidly, words tumbling over each other, firing theories and deductions like bullets. This was the icing on the cake for him, not only the deduction but the chance to show off about it, even to those who were deeply cynical about his ability.

“What no-one realised is that the victim had recently won a considerable sum on the National Lottery. She had elected for no publicity in order to keep her good fortune a closely-guarded secret and was largely successful. 

“However, she had made several large purchases of late. Electronic equipment, new clothes, the things a poor woman given sudden access to riches would treat herself to and unfortunately someone was very observant - the boyfriend, Mr Clements, whose butchery business was failing and who thought Ms Roper would fund his imagined future life of luxury. As they had recently clashed on several aspects of the future life he was envisioning, she let him know that her own forthcoming plans did not include him, which he took great exception to, of course.”

He looked first at the culprit, then around at the rest of the people in the room, trying to stumble on some awestruck looks of admiration which weren’t on the horizon. This time he wasn’t getting the reaction he’d been craving. So he turned from the Met officers, who were more intent on wrapping up the details, and sought out the most positive thing in the room, the rapt expression on John’s face. Someone, then, still thought he was a genius.

“Sherlock that was brilliant,” John breathed, his eyes shining, no trace of irony or sarcasm in his voice or on his face. 

Normally he would have either basked in John’s sincere admiration or sought out the signs of mockery, but this time Sherlock’s expression turned bland. Didn’t John always respond this way, leaving him to deduce whether or not John was teasing him? Not exactly boring but the reaction was almost Pavlovian by now. What was one to expect from a man who would never admit to being an adrenaline junkie but showed all the signs nonetheless?

“Elementary, John,” he said coolly, and was surprised when his words didn’t square with his own physical response at all. He knew he had come up with a legitimately brilliant deduction which none of the others had even considered. This was odd. His heart was beating rapidly and his breath was coming in short bursts. He frowned; his reaction focussed totally on John, on the admiration on his smiling face, the dilation of his pupils, the sheen of sweat on his face.

This particular deduction didn’t take him long. He and John were of a mind, then. He slowly returned John’s smile. There was only one thing for it.

“Come along, John,” he said. “You’ll want to write this up in your blog.”

“Well, yes, but…”

“Now, John, before the details desert you. You’ll want to spend some time thinking up some new phrases, won’t you?”

John rolled his eyes. “Because I’m such a Philistine,” he said.

“You have to admit that your blog is getting a little repetitious, your overuse of the word ‘fantastic’ for example. You’ve used it at least once in the last six entries on your blog,” Sherlock told him before grabbing his arm, placing his other hand at the small of his back, and taking off in a showy swirl of coat, dragging John with him. Pity the media weren’t privy to the scene, he thought. It would look impressive on the News at Ten.

John barely had time to bristle at the insult to his literary skills, or to fling a hasty goodbye over his shoulder before he was being pulled away. He did hear giggling from behind them, though. This was going to be all over the Met tomorrow.

He wondered what the hurry was. There were rules to this sort of thing. Weren’t there rules? John tried to remember what they might be, but he couldn’t. Something about not starting until they were in the flat. He was now totally distracted by what Sherlock was doing. There was still a hand on the small of his back but now it was rubbing over the fabric of his coat in slow, gentle circles.

He wondered about it even more in the cold outside, waiting at the taxi rank. They had to wait a very long time for a cab. At this time of the night-turned-morning in this part of London they were few and far between. Most of them would be out in the sticks somewhere, on the way back from taking some drunken party-goers home.

“Perhaps we should walk,” Sherlock said.

John frowned back at Sherlock, who was almost hopping on the spot in frustration. 

“Walk?” He was tired, he was cold, and it would take them a very long time to walk back to Baker Street from here. Besides, his jeans were getting pretty tight by now. “You’re kidding, right?” He frowned. “What’s the hurry?”

“TAXI!”

John was nearly knocked over in the rush as Sherlock stepped out into the road - narrowly missing a Flash Harry in an electric blue Porsche - his hand raised high to hail a passing black cab. John could have sworn he saw Sherlock return the rude gesture that Flash Harry flipped them in return.

“Hey!” John started, heart in his mouth as the Porsche swerved to avoid Sherlock, but he was ignored both by the driver and by his flat-mate, who was diving into the back of the taxi. 

“Come on, John!” Sherlock snapped, before settling himself on the seat and leaning forward to give instructions to the cabbie.

 

John, who had a lingering mistrust of cab drivers for some reason which he had never been able to explain to Sherlock’s satisfaction, was slow to follow. “Give me a minute,” he said, favouring his leg as he slid onto the seat beside Sherlock. He was just as grateful as Sherlock to be in a taxi, he thought, he hadn’t really wanted that long walk either. With the passage of time the pain in his leg was no longer psychosomatic. He just wasn’t making such a bloody song and dance about it.

 

During the ride home, John watched the long fingers of Sherlock’s right hand encased in the black leather of his gloves tapping impatiently on his knee. His breath caught in his throat, riveted by the movement, and he suddenly wished the glove was touching his own knee, caressing gently, re-learning the shape of his patella as his flat-mate’s hand often did when they sat together and Sherlock’s mind was miles away on a case. He liked to think that at those times the contact provided Sherlock with some much-needed grounding, and maybe even a little inspiration.

Sherlock didn’t speak during the journey. He didn’t look at John, didn’t even look out of the cab windows. He was no doubt running over the case in his head from beginning to end. Lestrade would want to see them tomorrow, it would be wise to have the facts straight. 

He frowned. Sherlock didn’t exactly look very well. He was pale and his breath was coming in short puffs, catching in his throat by the looks of it. And was that sweat on his upper lip? John had never seen that before.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

“Fine. Fine.”

And then John felt the sensation of a hand on his thigh. Sherlock was being clever, John thought. In the dark interior of the cab the intimate area now covered by his black glove wouldn’t be seen by the cabbie. John took a deep breath, which he hoped was both unobtrusive and unseen. It very much looked like he was going to be shagged into the mattress when they got in, which was fine with him.

Until they reached Baker Street that was the extent of the communication between them. John stared out the window at London’s familiar landmarks passing by and concentrated on his breathing as the invisible glove teased his thigh mercilessly, kneading the flesh beneath John’s jeans. The leathery fingers, slipping further down between his legs pressed against his inseam and stayed there.

John made a small noise which he told himself wasn’t a squeak and Sherlock looked over at him and smiled a sunny smile, the bastard. And the cabbie was giving him a sly grin in the rear view mirror. John was slightly horrified to think that the man could see the long, elegant hand moving to stroke his thigh, kneading his flesh, measuring the length of his thigh bone. And then the horror dissolved into pure want, his groin ached and his jeans suddenly became too tight and he stopped caring what the cabbie might have thought.

The taxi had barely stopped before Sherlock was flinging money at the cabbie, and striding toward their front door. John followed at a more leisurely pace, huffing out heavy breaths, telling himself that he wasn’t having great difficulty in walking the few steps to their front door. The case was over, he told himself, and he didn’t see what the rush was, although he’d love a cup of tea about now. He heard Sherlock’s voice in his head:

‘Denial, denial, denial…’

No it wasn’t, he told his treacherous brain irritably. Nothing of the sort.

About the time the street door closed, John found himself whirled around and dragged up the stairs before he could catch his breath.

“Sh…”

“My thoughts exactly,” Sherlock interrupted as he unlocked their front door. “Shhh…she’ll hear us.”

“Where are we going?”

“I’m going to my room,” Sherlock said. “Perhaps you’d like to join me there?”

Sherlock was never tired, John thought desperately. “You’re never tired,” he repeated aloud.

They were in Sherlock’s room now, with its unmade bed and most of the surfaces covered in the same kind of detritus as the rest of the flat. The light snapped on. 

Sherlock took off his coat, hanging it on the back of the door, unwound his scarf, unbuttoned his jacket. Undid the top button of his white shirt. And so on. 

“Another successful conclusion,” John said, trying to distract Sherlock from the path his thoughts were evidently taking.

“Quite satisfying.”

“Well, I’ll leave you to it, then.”

“John.”

It wasn’t a shout but all the same John stopped walking toward the door. “What?” he asked, looking at Sherlock over his shoulder.

Sherlock was sitting on his bed, taking off the rest of his clothes. “Come over here, would you?” he said lightly. John really was slow on the uptake sometimes.

“It’s late, what do you want?” John asked.

“Well, you, obviously,” Sherlock said. “Over here. I think the sexual foreplay has had the desired effect and you want me as much as I want you.”

“That was foreplay?”

Sherlock shrugged. “As much as I could get away with in public,” he said.

John’s heart lifted, he gave his lover a fond smile but tried to make it reproach him at the same time. “You could’ve said that before,” he said, “but no, you just had to wind me up, didn’t you?” He was annoyed at himself, too, knowing he’d reacted as he always did, with unthinking capitulation and the expected surrender. It was natural to him by now. And what did that make him?

“Come here, John.”

Sherlock was right, of course. John really, really wanted to join him on the bed but there was a little sweet anticipation in staying right where he was. Not defiance, he didn’t have it in him any longer when it came to Sherlock. “I haven’t had my tea and biscuits,” he said. There was a routine to these things, there were rules.

There was also a slight inclination of Sherlock’s head which overrode those rules, a pause while he regarded John solemnly. “Take your clothes off, John,” he said, not at all patiently as he made for the door.

“Where are you going?”

“The bathroom,” Sherlock said.

“Oh.”

Sherlock disappeared and John decided to take advantage of the brief hiatus and rapidly took his clothes off, dropping them on the floor. He was definitely up for this tonight, not really thinking too hard about why, and was determined to be ready for when Sherlock returned. It was made easier by the fact that he’d recently stopped wearing underwear to crime scenes. They only got ripped off him on those nights when they got home after one of those difficult cases which had taken all of Sherlock’s ingenuity. 

Those were the nights when Sherlock dragged him into the bedroom, unceremoniously turned him over and jumped him in celebration, asserting his right to do so. He really couldn’t afford to keep replacing underwear like that, even the inexpensive ones he favoured. After all, Sherlock did solve rather a lot of cases.

He just hoped he’d never need to go to hospital after one of their cases. It would be really embarrassing trying to explain his lack of underwear to the hospital staff.

When Sherlock returned to the bedroom, he frowned at what he saw. John was lying naked on his stomach on the bed, waiting for him with his head laid on his folded arms, no doubt anticipating the hands on him, the weight on him, the sheer contentment of feeling the warm, familiar bulk that would soon be filling him.

John really could be incredibly boring and obvious sometimes, Sherlock thought, though to be fair John was all but programmed for it now, it was what they always did these days, since he’d found out the truth about John. “What’s this?” he asked.

John looked back at him with a beautiful smile, his expression one of pure anticipation mixed with the admission of surrender that Sherlock craved from him. Sherlock watched him, fascinated, as a shiver went through him, rippling the skin of his back. It was rather attractive, Sherlock thought. He’d never seen that particular effect before.

“What does it look like?” John asked, wriggling slightly.

“It looks like your bottom, John.”

“Amazing deduction. Brilliant, Sherlock, I’m so impressed.”

Sherlock found that, after all, it was easy to tell when John was being sarcastic. “It was easily recognisable,” he said. “I am quite familiar with it,” Sherlock pointed out. “I even picked broken glass out of it on one occasion with a pair of tweezers.”

“Yes, I remember,” John grimaced at the memory. “So come and get reacquainted,” he invited and bent his left knee to move his leg seductively to one side, bunching Sherlock’s Irish linen sheet under him.

What was this, this submission that still, in some way, hid a trace of command?

The searching expression on Sherlock’s face spoke of new things, of a different kind of excitement, had John noticed them. “Get up, John,” he said in a tone which clearly wasn’t an invitation, it was a requirement.

“What?”

“I want you to get up off that bed, call upon an aspect of your nature that currently lies dormant somewhere within and, to put it crudely, shag me through the mattress.”

“Oh.”

“You’ve thought about it.”

Yes, he had. Now and then, when Sherlock was being more brilliant than usual and the devotion just lodged in his chest, causing the adrenaline to course through his veins and the beating of his heart got so loud he thought everyone must hear it.

“Now’s the time, John. Do you want it?”

Did he want it? He didn’t know. It had never happened this way before. It may never happen again.

“Take your shirt off,” John said, trying the sound of the instruction in his mouth, trying not to sound as if he was pleading rather than telling. He rolled over and off the bed, and Sherlock could tell by the state of him that he’d had something else entirely in mind for tonight. What John always wanted, perhaps, something involving self-denial and a yearning to be subjugated. Perhaps another time. Tonight Sherlock was unexpectedly giving him a gift. Maybe even one he’d dreamed of when lying in his usual position, on his belly with his legs open, panting silently, obeying the instruction not to come until ordered to.

John stood next to him, watching hungrily as the shirt came off. Sherlock was going to lay it neatly on his chair, but John snatched it out of his hands and threw it on the floor.

Sherlock didn’t say anything but his eyes grew large and his eyebrows climbed.

“Dolce and Gabbana?” John asked.

“Yes.”

“Very expensive, I bet.”

Sherlock nodded.

“Too bad,” John shrugged. “And the rest, please. If you would.”

How easily he fitted this particular role, Sherlock thought.

He was the one to feel the shiver now, seated in his belly, shaking him when he wanted to remain steady. John was doing it again, surprising him. It was the very reason why Sherlock wanted to do this thing tonight, this thing they didn’t do. For the surprise, for the thrill. And for John, who’d claimed to have shagged half the women in the Western world but who had never, before Sherlock, known how this felt.

His hands went to his fly, trying to remove his trousers as quickly as possible. He looked at John from under his eyelashes, noting John’s advanced state of arousal. This was going to be fantastic. His sure fingers betrayed him, fumbled with the zip, and then John’s hands were on him, batting his own away, yanking his trousers down.

“Spencer Hart!” Sherlock hissed as John’s full weight advanced and toppled him onto the bed.

John’s hands were everywhere. He felt them on his chest and belly, but even as he registered them, they moved to unlace his shoes and pull his socks off in less time than it took to think about it.

“John, they’re…”

“Oh, don’t tell me, some other bloody expensive designer label?”

“Well, yes.”

“Shut up, Sherlock,” John growled as he wrestled them both into the right position to remind them both that this was actually about more than sex, more than who was in control. It was about showing each other tenderness, which he proved with the gentle passion of his kiss.

Sherlock had to shut up; he had John’s tongue in his mouth. It tasted of spearmint and the lingering tang of tannin. He wondered briefly if John’s words tasted like this as they left his voice-box. Endless, endless possibilities.

And then John’s mouth broke free, but only to allow him more room to jerk Sherlock’s underwear off him. There was a tearing sound as the rich fabric ripped in John’s hands.

“Those cost a fortune!” Sherlock protested. “They’re – were – Calvin Kl…”

“Only fair, Sherlock, you’ve ruined no end of mine.”

“Maybe so, but yours didn’t cost….” Sherlock cut himself off in mid-sentence again. 

He’d promised himself that he wasn’t going to make any more remarks about the quality of John’s clothing, mindful of the fact that John still wore most of the same clothes that he’d owned since they first met and that John’s family fortune mainly consisted of an average-sized house in Edinburgh belonging to his parents, who at their advanced time of life had not long finished the mortgage payments.

John waited for the end of the sentence, which didn’t come. He was going to start in with the kissing again – he loved that, Sherlock knew - but Sherlock wanted more.

“Come on, John,” he said. “You need to place me on my back.”

“I do?”

“Well, yes. For optimal penetration and maximum fulfilment you know. It really is the best position for both parties.”

“Oh, okay. So where do you…”

Sherlock sighed. John really wasn’t into this with him, was he? There was always going to be some line of demarcation between himself and the women John had bedded. In his hesitation John was proving that he truly believed his place was on his belly in this bed, or on all fours on the floor. So it was still up to him, really. He moved himself into the position he judged would give them both the greatest pleasure. Flat on his back, one knee raised and pushed to the side to accommodate John’s body between his legs.

“This, do you think?” he said.

“Um…I…yes…” John wasn’t inclined to argue. His mouth was watering and he didn’t want to drool on Sherlock’s chest. He coughed and swallowed the saliva, which put him in mind of something else he’d never done to Sherlock. He flushed deep red and tried not to let Sherlock see it.

“Good,” Sherlock nodded. “Now, you’ll need to arouse us both, John. Think you can do that?” He raised his head to look down the length of his own body. “Although I see you’re quite aroused already.”

“You, too,” John said, and that seemed to be all he could manage at that moment.

“Come on, then, John. The night draws on.”

John slid in between Sherlock’s thighs, which by turns in the past he’d described as both ‘skinny’ and ‘slender’, depending on how out of sorts he was at the time.

Tonight they were slender and he felt them close around him in a possessive but gentle embrace, proving how strong they also were.

“I’m quite hard already,” Sherlock was saying, and John suddenly wondered if he was a mind-reader as well as a complete dickhead. “You may wish to help me along with your mouth, though. Can you do that?”

John just wanted him to shut up. Tonight was for silence and tenderness, for gentle movement in the dark. It was about him showing Sherlock how much he was loved. But Sherlock had other ideas.

“You’re really quite big, you know,” Sherlock was saying. “I don’t know why you’ve never wanted to…”

He was abruptly cut off by the pull of John’s lips on his cock, the gentle suckling drawing him inside a mouth which clearly had to struggle to accommodate him. It was a wonderful feeling but he pulled back slightly. Despite John’s enthusiasm Sherlock didn’t want their encounter to leave him with lingering regrets.

But when he felt John start to release him, he pushed gently inside again. The lips closed around him, the suction was steady and strong. He lay back with his eyes closed and pictured what John looked like just now.

John’s hair tickled his inner thighs, he felt the muffled huff of laughter which came bubbling out of John’s mouth around its burden of flesh.

He opened his eyes. “John?”

John’s lips left him briefly. His eyes were shining, his mouth was smiling. “I love this,” he said. “I love you.”

It was too much. Sherlock felt the need rush over him. “Now, John. Now.”

Then there were hands, making it easier, helping. A series of small snapping noises as John started to do what he thought was necessary for protection.

“John, is your reputation deserved?”

In the midst of his quest for gentleness, John paused. “What?”

“Three Continents? Three? How many women have you treated to this performance? I am not a woman, in case it slipped your notice.”

“But I thought…”

“Please, John, stick to what you do best. Forget the condom. Just give me what you've got."

John gave up on the condom and dropped it on the floor.

Sherlock’s legs tightened around John’s back, he lay flat and waited. And finally, much to his lover’s relief, John whispered “Sorry, sorry….” And let himself go.

Well, Sherlock thought, as John pounded him into the mattress, he had asked for this. The bulk inside him was giving pleasure as well as taking it. John had often accused him of lazily reclining on the sofa all day. It may well be that tomorrow he’d be lying on the sofa incapable of stirring.

This was really delightful, he thought. He couldn’t help cataloguing the sensations John was providing, and in such strange places. He’d never imagined having an orgasm in his shins before but it was spreading warmth all over his body. Part of him wanted to get up and write all this down. But there was John, soldiering on, a bit red in the face now, trying so hard, believing he was providing a distraction from the work. 

And he was, he really was. Sherlock found at last that getting up to record the thought processes he was experiencing was more than just ‘not good’. He couldn’t do that to John. He’d be so disappointed. So he just lay there and felt it all, through the boring bit when John was just thrusting away there, face getting redder and voice hoarse and cracked, all the way through to the moment when he realised what John’s kind hands were doing. The left was on him, pulling him through an orgasm that was every bit as delightful as a crime scene, the right was stroking his hair with such heartbreaking tenderness that, even if he hadn’t already known, he could no longer be in any doubt about how much he was loved. He’d known it would be perfect.

He arched under John, meeting him halfway, listening to all the various noises John made, enjoying it all thoroughly. Some of them he’d heard before, some of them were new. He was glad he’d insisted on this tonight. They should do this again sometime, he thought. Perhaps not soon, he loved being inside John too much, loved what he could do to him even with his voice alone. But one day…

Even as he was coming down, a feeling closely akin to ones he’d had in the past under various influences, John suddenly gripped him harder, slid into him that bit further, gave a sharp cry, and stopped moving. 

“Lift yourself up, John,” Sherlock instructed. “I think you may find that much more pleasant.”

John dutifully raised himself up on his hands and the angle of entry suddenly changed. Sherlock experienced a curious stretch of his muscles which was uniquely pleasurable all on its own, although it would probably sting in the morning, and a feeling inside him that completely surprised him. 

He hadn’t expected to actually feel this part, but there it was, a tickle as John’s fluid spurted and pulsed even as John made some more of those joyful noises, sighed and pushed twice more before he was overcome by what Sherlock surmised was an excess of feeling and pain in his shoulder, stopped moving again and lay down on Sherlock, gasping for breath.

Sherlock reached out for him, but John was sliding away now, back and out, too far down his body to touch, panting, still trying to give service, as was his nature, licking at Sherlock’s spent and sensitive cock as he usually did, before stilling completely to lie beside him.

“Come here, John,” Sherlock murmured and waited until John recovered. Then it was only a few moments before John was reclaiming his rightful place lying beneath Sherlock, lifting his head to kiss Sherlock’s already-swollen mouth.

“That was a surprise,” John said tenderly. “Really nice.”

Sherlock moved one arm to wrap around him. “Oh, good,” he said. 

“So…um…”

“For my next trick…”

The attempt at humour was lost on John. “Hmm?”

“I think as an experiment it went rather well, don’t you?”

“But you wouldn’t want to repeat it?” John said sleepily, and the resignation in his voice was clear. John thought he was never going to get to do that ever again.

“I didn’t say that. It just provides more options.”

“Ah.”

“So you wouldn’t object?”

“No,” John murmured. “Just not too…”

And he was asleep.

Sherlock wondered what the rest of that sentence was going to be. Not too often? Not too certain? Not too soon? He knew John very well, he could guess. But he was still going to ask John in the morning, assuming John remembered what he’d been about to say. Sherlock wouldn’t put it past him to have blanked it out. This was only fair, really, given the amount of information Sherlock himself had deleted. Yes, once in a while, he thought, was only fair.

If events developed as Sherlock hoped they might, Mrs Hudson would be pleased. She may also be a little shocked, but she’d always wanted some married ones to boast about to Mrs Turner. Well, perhaps sort-of engaged ones would have to do, Sherlock thought, and moved down John’s body, dropping moist kisses wherever his lips happened to fall, travelling up and down as far as he could reach, trying not to catch John’s springy pubic hair in his teeth.

Sherlock was mildly surprised when John returned his temperate embrace. The moonlight outside was falling on John’s hair, silver laid on silvering blond. Sherlock found himself pleased that he would get to see John like this, in every season and in all the ways they would find to do this. 

In sleep, John’s face still looked a little bemused, as if he couldn’t quite believe what had happened here tonight.

Sherlock smiled to himself. A little turnabout was always a good thing; he was glad that he’d thought of this. They really would have to try it again sometime.

He shifted slightly and winced. 

Not tomorrow, though.

End


End file.
